Music Director Eun Sun Kim is at the center of the repertory, and a long Wagner arc is now officially underway
Rachel Willis-Sørensen and Stephen Costello make their returns to the Met later this month and Grand Tier Grab Bag anticipates their performances by sharing them in the Act II duet from Don Carlo recorded in Munich this spring as well as a taste of Willis-Sørensen’s Liebestod
In Lohengrin, populism comes to an apocalyptic end on the Bavarian stage
Rachel Willis-Sorensen is the winner of the 2025 Beverly Sills Award, per the Met press office
Revivals of Falstaff in Milan and Don Carlo in Naples have Larry Wolff thinking across the six decades of Verdi‘s career
If song recitals by opera stars Piotr Beczala and Asmik Grigorian sometimes came up short, Semyon Bychkov’s powerful rendition of the Glagolitic Mass instantly became one of the year’s highlights.
Patrick Mack reviews yet another Puccini album from Jonas Kaufmann
The Richard Tucker Foundation Gala has always been a big annual celebration of the voice with an emphasis on big-voiced singers in big repertoire (not much Wagner usually, though…). Like so many reliable operatic institutions it has struggled for survival after the pandemic.
Rare is the revival of Il trovatore that boasts five first-rate singers, and such an occasion should be treasured. And so, at the Met last Saturday, it was.
Oh, La traviata, how do I love thee? Let me count the recordings.
Out of sheer morbid curiosity last evening I pulled up the “orders” page of my Amazon account and searched Otello to discover that over the past 11 years. I’ve ordered 15 items with that title (one as recently as last night!)
In Richard Strauss’s Arabella, the heroine is consumed with finding the right man—der Richtige—but who is the right Arabella?
Lyric Opera of Chicago’s Don Carlos was a real feast of good singing and orchestral grandeur.
It’s nice to see Sony Classical backing a serious operatic soprano and not some crossover refugee from Britain’s Got Talent or another syrupy Christmas album from the world’s reigning Heldentenor.
The Met’s recent Ariadne auf Naxos and Elektra combo left me wanting more and more Richard Strauss, so Trove Thursday offers a complete Capriccio with Jonas Kaufmann (his one-and-only Flamand) and Christopher Maltman vying for Soile Isokoski.
After the break the ladies stepped up their game so much that it elevated the night into legendary status: definitely one for the books!
Ryan McKinny’s Don is subtler, slyer, smoother, with a sharp wit and sense of dark humor that gives added dimension to the role.
Lyric Opera of Chicago’as Don Giovanni lands smack dab in the middle of our current debate about wanted or unwanted sexual advances and outright sexual abuse.
“Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?” went the introduction to the 1940s radio program The Shadow, an apt description for the San Francisco Opera’s production of Rusalka.
I was shocked to realize I hadn’t seen Don Giovanni at the Met since Michael Grandage’s stultifying production opened in 2011.
A 1985 broadcast of Don Giovanni featuring Cheryl Studer, Gundula Janowitz (as Elvira!), Krisztina Laki, Gösta Winbergh, Hermann Prey (in a rare outing as the Don) and Malcolm King conducted by Jeffrey Tate.
The dream cast put together for this second revival of Kasper Holten’s Don Giovanni production shines at the Royal Opera House.
It was odd, if not downright uncomfortable, to watch Le Nozze di Figaro at the Metropolitan Opera.
It is always a pleasure to hear a great orchestra take on a major score that might sound half-muffled emerging from the pit of an opera house.
Tell us: Filth or dementia?
Hasten thee to feed another quarter of conversation for The Talk of the Town!
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